INDIA
BJP leaders to face trial
The Supreme Court yesterday ordered four senior leaders of the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to stand trial over a 1992 attack on an ancient mosque that sparked Hindu-Muslim violence that killed thousands. A lower court had earlier dropped conspiracy charges against the four. Hindu groups say the 16th-century Babri Mosque in Ayodha was built after a temple dedicated to the Hindu god King Ram was destroyed by Muslim invaders. Hindu fundamentalists with pickaxes and crowbars razed the structure to the ground in December 1992. The four party leaders are accused of making inflammatory speeches that incited thousands of their followers who had camped out in Ayodhya ahead of the Dec. 6 attack on the mosque. The four — L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Uma Bharti and Kalyan Singh — have said that the mosque’s demolition was a spontaneous eruption by angry Hindu activists. Singh, currently a provincial governor and immune from prosecution, is to go on trial after his term ends.
RUSSIA
Search on after ship sinks
A cargo ship carrying grain capsized yesterday during a storm in the Black Sea and one of the 12 crew members on board has been rescued, emergency services said. A search was under way for the remaining crew members, but emergency services said that high waves and strong winds were hampering the operation. The marine transport agency said that the crew of the Turkish-owned Heroes of Arsenal included nine Ukrainians, two Russians and one Georgian, Tass news agency reported. The rescued sailor was from Ukraine. The ship left the port city of Azov loaded with grain and capsized near the Kerch Strait. The vessel was carrying up to 30 tonnes of oil products in its hold, raising concerns of environmental damage, Tass reported.
UNITED STATES
Russian jets near Alaska
Two Russian long-range bombers flew about 160km off the Alaskan coast on Monday night, the first time since President Donald Trump took office that Moscow has sent warplanes so close to the nation, the military said on Tuesday. The two Tu-95 Bear bombers flew off Kodiak Island, within a 200-mile (322km) area called the air defense identification zone. The bombers’ approach prompted the air force to scramble two F-22 stealth jets and an E-3 airborne early-warning plane to intercept the Russian planes, said 1st Lieutenant Lauren Hill, a spokeswoman for the North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado. After the US jets flew alongside the Russian bombers for several minutes, the Russian planes broke off and headed back to their base in eastern Russia, Hill said.
PHILIPPINES
Bus accident toll rises to 31
The death toll from a bus that plunged into a ravine rose to 31 with signs that overloading contributed to the crash, a police official said yesterday. Tuesday’s accident, which saw the bus come off a winding road to fall 24m into a ravine in the upland province of Nueva Ecija, also left 46 people injured, with four still in a critical condition, Senior Superintendent Antonio Yarra said. “The wheel burst and that caused the bus to fall into ravine. It seems that it was overloaded. Because of the overloading, it was beyond the capacity of the wheel to hold,” the provincial police chief said. He said a count determined there were 77 passengers on board, higher than earlier estimates. He declined to say who might be held responsible as the investigation was ongoing.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was